Hannah Carpenter

The expansion of biotechnology's frontiers include in vitro gametogenesis (IVG), which allows the generation of gametes from pluripotent stem cells. By analyzing discourses from two IVG companies – Conception and Ivy Natal – the authors examine the framing of IVG as a continuation of normalized IVF practices and a revolutionary reproductive technology. The paper suggests that IVG proponents engage in “ontological choreography” to integrate their technology into existing accepted reproductive frameworks while simultaneously mobilizing liberatory arguments emphasizing reproductive autonomy, expanded reproductive access, and genetic kinship. The authors highlight tensions in how IVG is temporally framed within idealized futures of expanded reproductive access. The paper also examines a workshop organized by the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine in 2023, illustrating how commercial actors selectively engage with ethical arguments in ways that narrow the complexity of issues at stake. The authors conclude with the need for enhanced public deliberation regarding IVG's trajectory.

In their article, Romanis and Adkins delineate pregnancy loss and procreative loss to show that the former is possible without the latter, as in the case of artificial amnion and placenta technology.1 Here, we are interested in examining the reverse—procreative loss without pregnancy loss—to further tease apart these two types of loss. We discuss two cases: being forced to continue a pregnancy despite fetal demise due to abortion restrictions and choosing to selectively reduce a multifetal pregnancy. Our analysis buttresses the authors’ conclusion: due to our fetal-centric conception of pregnancy, we are only able to value pregnancy instrumentally (ie, for the fetus), not intrinsically. Understanding pregnancy as an embodied state rather than a process that not only acknowledges the intrinsic value of pregnancy for pregnant people but also encourages society to intrinsically value pregnant people is important. In 2022, the Supreme Court of the United States removed the constitutional right to an abortion in Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization, shifting the responsibility of determining abortion regulations to individual US states.2 Due to the Dobbs decision, there …